[Syrupmakers] Making Sorghum

Wed Oct 3 11:38:01 PDT 2007

I ALWAYS wanted to know what T C stood for !   Now, I don't have to ask.  Great story ! Thanks.
                                 Richard

G Wilson <glenarchie at webtv.net> wrote:
          This year I decided that I was going to get things ready to make syrup ahead of time.   I started two weeks before , setting up the mill , cooker tables ,chairs canopy, getting all the tool ready etc.  I washed jars, prepared food for our potluck dinner, I did everything I could think of before. 

    We cut a wagon load ( a BIG wagon load ) September 22nd , a week before cooking time.  We had 12 people stripping and cutting so it didn't take long and it was fun.  We cut the same number of rows that we cut last year but the stalks were much larger this year due to the abundant rain we've had ( about 50 inches ).  We laid the stalks across the 8 foot wagon bed and made sure the heads were lined up evenly then I cut the heads off with a chainsaw.  The chainsaw idea was great, it saved a lot of of work as compared to using loppers to cut the heads of one at a time.

      Last Saturday was SYRUP MAKIN TIME.

      I got outside about 7:30 AM.  There set Old BUD, age 91, and Bob, age 82, ready to get things started .  We washed out the 95 gallon SS pan one more time .  I started my 1935 Farmall F20 tractor with the hand crank, ( it took only 4 pulls on the crank ). I let it warm up for a minuet or so then engaged the flat belt pulley.  The mill was running and the guys started hand feed ing the stalks in to the mill.  The juice was flowing and I mean flowing, we were amazed at how much juice was coming out of the mill.  The stalks were large diameter and long.  We have a 2 inch plastic pipe 20 feet long running  from the mill to our pan with a filter on both ends.  Old Bud's job is to tend the filter coming out of the mill and hi wife Charlotte tends the filter going in to the pan.  Bob is in charge of the mill , the feeding of the cane and also lubricating  and cleaning up after we finish crushing cane.  We have another man with a pitch fork taking the pumi away from the mill
 in to  a high loader bucket to be taken away.  The OLD F20 Farmall just chugged along like it was having a good time, didn't even open the governor.  It was a beautiful sound.
       When the pan had about 2 inches of juice I turned on the  6 propane burners on high.  It wasn't long until it was boiling. we had a steady stream of juice coming in, we were filling up fast.  I had the guys take a 20 minuet break so we could steam off some juice.  In about 2 hours we had the tank full and still had a lot of of stalks left so we filled Old Bud's 20 gallon cooker then we filled 3 five gallon buckets and still ha cane on the wagon so we filled a 25 gallon plastic tub with juice.  Everyone as amazed at the amount of juice we had.  We now had  decision to make , what were we going to do with that much juice.  We decide to add it to the cooker as it boiled down.  We finished crushing about 11:00 AM.  While we were crushing some of the folks were stripping cane for next weeks cooking.  When we finished cleaning up the mill and equipment it was noon and dinner time.
    We had 40 people here for our pot luck dinner every family brought a dish.  We had 2 eight foot tables full of food that the ladies had set out along with drinks , plates etc.  It just happened that a Baptist preacher from Arkansas showed up about this time wanting some sorghum seed.  I told him I would make him a deal, he could have all the seed heads he wanted if he would say the prayer for lunch ( I'm not much good at praying in public ) so he gave us one of the best prayers I've ever heard.   We all gorged ourselves, every dish looked so good we had to sample everything. All the women were watching to see if the dish they brought was being eaten.  We had enough food to feed 100 people. It was good. After everyone had eaten there dinner Old Bud stood up and Announced that we were going to sell one of the rag rugs that he made.  Unbeknownst to me and everyone here  Cowboy was an auctioneer and he auctioned off Bud's rug.  Another family had brought a quart of honey. 
 The proceeds to go to the cost of putting on the festival.

    My friend Jim brought his Cub Farmall with a burr mill mounted on the back.  He made cracked wheat cereal and also ground corn in to cornmeal.

   Mean while the juice was boiling away.  Bob Said , Wilson pull that wagon out to the cane patch , its time to cut a load for next week.  Four people were cutting and four people were lining up the heads for the chainsaw and it didn't take long to cut a load.
   It was 6:OO o'clock when the syrup was making foaming and making bubbles as big  as a hogs eye.  I shut down the fire and we let it cool down some before we started bottling the syrup.  We bottled 15 1/2 gallons of syrup .  My wife made a large pan of biscuits that she brought out just as we finished.  there was a lot of foam still in the pan so everyone dragged there biscuit through the foam to taste the syrup.  Oh it was some kind of good.   We filled the pan with about 2 inches of water , warmed it up and everyone joined in and scrubbed the pan and all the equipment clean for next.
week.
It was  fun day

Tall Cane Wilson
Eureka, Kansas
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